From Harford County Public Schools:
Dear Harford County Public Schools Community,
I’ve been watching the events unfolding across our country in response to the murder of George Floyd, and I am struck by how important it is for our school system to advance our commitment to eliminating racism and discrimination in our school system.
Unfortunately, schools and educational systems struggle with deep disparities in outcomes related to student discipline and achievement that remain entirely too predictable by race, ethnicity, and zip codes. In HCPS, we recognize those disparities and we are committed to working tirelessly to address them. The protests occurring across our country are not just the product of one tragic incident, but of many. In HCPS, we must do a better job of confronting the history and experiences of our Black students. We must be the catalyst for healing that will allow us to prevent future violence rather than just condemn it.
The Harford County Board of Education and the school system administrators are absolutely committed to eliminating racism and discrimination in our schools and community. This week, we are initiating a campaign under the hashtag #leadwithlove, to feature messages about our campaign to eliminate racism and discrimination.
We know there is more to be done. Our work does not end with a social media campaign, but we think it is important for our students, staff, and families to hear us say, right now, in this moment, that we stand with you and will continue to stand with you.
Standing with you,
Sean Bulson, Ed.D
Superintendent
Harford County Public Schools
Why do black lives only matter when that are taken by white police officers? There are over 300 blacks murdered in Baltimore City every single year and i see no marches, no protests and only silence.
We have been hearing this narrative for 50 years and we are tired of it. Blacks have every opportunity and have been elected to every office in our country. Every major city in the United States is run by minorities including police chiefs, council members and mayors. Most sports teams are dominated by minorities and these games are attended by majority white spectators and these athletes are embraced by whites.
We are tired of being told all whites are racists every time a black person is killed by a bad police officer. We are tired of being told that we should embrace the victimization of blacks as if they are all helpless second class citizens. There is nothing that blacks are not permitted to do that whites can. We have created many laws to remedy this over many years.
Is there still progress to be made, absolutely most will agree that we can always improve but we are sick of bring told we are the problem. None of us are in the cities gunning down blacks. None of us arrested george floyd nor took his life.
This kind of logic leads to the perpetuation of racism. Just as one white bad cop does not equal an entire nation white racists, a few black looters does not mean that every black person is a criminal.
Your comments about the “deep disparities in outcomes related to student discipline and achievement that remain entirely too predictable by race, ethnicity, and zip codes”
seem to be biased as well. You are the superintendent of the schools and student discipline has been a priority of the federal government for many years now. You have tried to tip the scales so that bad kids regardless of color are not removed from schools. The kids now know there are no consequences for even the most major of offenses. They stay in the schools corrupting other students and teachers are powerless to stop them.
It is so bad now that many teachers are leaving the profession they love because people like you protest your own ass instead of the teachers you represent. Now schools are so out of control that police need to be within schools to maintain order.
It appears that every time you try to place you finger on the scales to root out your perceived injustice, you only succeed in making things much worse.
Teach our kids reading, writing and arithmetic… we parents will handle the rest of our kids education.
There is no citizen that I know of that takes an oath to “Protect and Serve” like police, military, fire fighters and many other such enforcement agencies.
Remarks about what citizens do to each other to protect the actions of what people who take an oath is just another example of finding an excuse for those who are sworn to protect and serve.
No, Your excuse about they take an “oath to protect and serve” is just a way to release the responsibility for citizens to have the common decency-not to kill each other..
Well stated and I totally agree with you!
Bulson says this: “Unfortunately, schools and educational systems struggle with deep disparities in outcomes related to student discipline and achievement that remain entirely too predictable by race, ethnicity, and zip codes”
Sean, Can you give us some specifics? are you saying HCPS gives worse discipline to minority students?
You’ve been the leader for two years, Where’s the change???
Okay, let’s start by giving the same standard of discipline to all students. Because a zip code may contain a larger population of one color over another should not be a disparity when it comes to discipline or achievement, it should apply to all students in all schools within the county.
Das rite white boi you bow down to duh BBC
Bulson is apologizing for a problem that doesn’t exist. No black kid is discriminated against in Harford County just because of their color. If it was actually happening it would be Bulson’s fault as the Superintendent and instead of a statement full of empty rhetoric he should resign in disgrace for allowing it on his watch. Instead we get a pointless zero content public statement and a hashtag “Oooh, look at me I’m toeing the social justice line with a hashtag and everything” what a clown!
I am fine with BLM and I recognize that slavery existed and racism still exists to this day. However, I won’t support BLM because they are against the Nuclear family model. The more the nuclear family goes away, the more the USA declines. I didn’t want and didn’t have “the village” raising my kids, and guess what–none of them are dead from drugs or in jail…
This is their statement from their website.
We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.
I’ve got a problem with BLM or any organization that does not see that ALL LIVES MATTER. With that being said, I have no idea why your school super intendent decided to come out with the statements he made. Seems to me this is a political message by a government employee who has no business making political statements. If he were running a police force that had some issues then I would be more understanding. Educators should teach that racism is NOT allowed, but to come out with “We Must Do a Better Job of Confronting the History and Experiences of Our Black Students” at this time was a political message. Bulson is paid to be the super intendent of your county’s schools, not to make politics his job or run social media campaigns. I find it more than ironic since there hasn’t been a student inside of the schools for quite some time now and he should be more concerned with getting the schools reopened in time and not about a bad police incident in Minnesota. I don’t think the parents or the students want schools shut down until 2021 and he should use his writing skills to urge the Governor to do just that instead of pandering a Democratic message of social injustice. Drop the political games Bulson and do your damn job….
Yes, I also loved what concerned citizen said on another page:
“WHITE PRIVILEGE – Studies show that the break-up of the family is a common cause of poverty. So perhaps we should talk about a “Two-Parent Privilege” instead of a “White Privilege”. Parents’ attitudes toward learning is a strong predictor of academic success. So maybe we’re dealing with a “Learning-Lover’s Privilege?”
Race does not dictate the strength of a marriage, parents’ attitudes toward learning, nor their propensity to lovingly and consistently discipline their children. Neither does race dictate financial status. Not all white kids are rich, and not all minorities are poor.”
Black lives don’t only matter when a cop takes it. Black people don’t like when other black people kill them either. But those folks actually get punished for their crimes. And there are CONSTANT things being done to protect the lives of blacks growing up in their communities. You don’t and won’t see that unless you live there.
Blacks do not have every opportunity. If you consider being able to make more money, move to a better neighborhood and put kids into better schools….yeah, these are good. However “better” school and “better” neighborhood just means it’s more “white”. Lets be honest. Imagine being the minority every where you go when you move to this “better” neighborhood.
Don’t use the term “one white bad cop” when that’s not what happened. This is “the latest cop”. Also, if regular citizens with no power were lawfully able to treat black people the way they have for centuries, what do you think a white man WITH power, a union, the courts, others in uniform and society on his side will do to black people? Don’t act like this isn’t a thing.
Yes, black people are allowed to do the same things as whites…on the surface. But history tells us that housing, lending, earning, educating, healthcare and SO much more are not the same experience for blacks as it is for whites. THIS year, Princeton, in it’s 274 year history just had it’s FIRST black valedictorian. Do you think that’s because black people weren’t smart enough to do it before? Or do you think that’s a result of deep rooted, systemic racism that’s been happening at every level since the beginning of this country?
I want you to understand how you,a white man, must feel after a few years of feeling like you’re being targeted, vilified, discriminated against and lumped in with others just because the color of your skin is white. Now take that same feeling and multiply it by 100s of years, but instead of just FEELING a certain way. Imagine reading in school about slavery and rape and murder and other DISGUSTING acts being done to your ancestors. Then imagine that the same people that did it to your ancestors somehow try to call you violent. They also tore your ancestors families apart and then tried to tell you it’s your fault that the family structure in your community is broken. They also introduced drugs into your community and destroyed it. If these things happened to your ancestors, and the country you lived in tried to approach it like “but that was so long ago”, you’d OBVIOUSLY be enraged, because look at your reaction to being treated a certain way based on the color of your skin only after a few years.
If you’ve never been black in america, you could NEVER understand what it’s like. What’s crazy is that black people have been fed the “white” America through the school systems, movie, tv, film, news media, politics, the workplace and more so it’s easy for a black person to see white people as a whole.
But white people don’t see black people as whole, just partial humans, unless they’re “special” blacks like Barack or LeBron or Sammy Davis Jr.
Whites don’t see black people as whole, normal people … especially if they don’t live amongst them. And this is the way a cop approaches his job when dealing with a “number 1 male”.
On a final note, I wonder if over the last few years everything that these cops had done to black people, had they done it to dogs, would you say “geez, these cops got a problem with dogs or what”? Or would you say “it’s just a few cops that seen to be bad apples”?
Bulson ran into trouble in North Carolina when he went soft on discipline. Look for him to repeat the same mistakes here before his contract runs out.